US House Republicans vote to authorise impeachment inquiry of Biden

Washington, Dec 14: The Republican-led US House of Representatives has voted to authorise impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden, in a 221-212 vote along party lines.

"The impeachment power resides solely with the House of Representatives," Xinhua news agency quoted Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan, a hardliner within the Republican party, as saying to reporters after the vote late Wednesday night.

"If a majority of the House now says we're in an official impeachment inquiry as part of our constitutional duty to do oversight, that carries weight. That's going to help us get these witnesses in," said the Ohio Republican, one of the leaders of the impeachment push.

Republicans hope that the impeachment inquiry vote would give them better legal standing to hold the President's son Hunter Biden in contempt of Congress should he fail to show.

Hunter Biden, the first child of a sitting president to be criminally indicted, appeared at a news conference outside the Capitol on Wednesday morning, when he again offered to testify in a public hearing, after refusing to appear at a closed-door deposition Republicans demanded.

As of now, no substantiated evidence has surfaced to demonstrate that President Joe Biden, in his current or past official capacities, engaged in the misuse of his position or accepted illicit payments.

However, ethical concerns have been raised regarding the international business dealings of the Biden family.

In a statement, House Speaker Mike Johnson said the chamber "will not prejudge the investigation's outcome" but "the evidentiary record is impossible to ignore".

Less than a year ahead of the 2024 presidential election, the President will be fighting a Republican impeachment bid while his son Hunter Biden struggles to avoid prison in tax and gun-related cases.